FACTS!

Additions: if your viral load is suppressed by medication to the point it’s undetectable, it’s considered untransmittable, even without condoms. Children with HIV+ carriers are usually given medication when they’re born, to make sure any of the virus doesn’t take hold (which we also do to adults who fear they’ve been exposed, it’s called PEP ((Post Exposure Prophylaxis)), which is a month of medication and must be started within 72 hours of exposure).

(There’s also PreP - Pre Exposure Prophylaxis, which is taking medication if you feel you are at risk of being exposed to HIV, whether through sexual partners or sharing injection needles)

This is why we need universal free healthcare - so people can go on and have happy, healthy lives despite the HIV diagnosis. Nobody should die or live in fear when the treatment is so damn simple and effective.

Wow wtf HIV/AIDS was discovered by Flossie Wong-Staal, an Chinese-American woman, and she’s the reason the HIV test even exists. AND THEN she invented the molecular knife that lead to treatments for HIV/AIDS. And she’s STILL ALIVE. We don’t hear about the contributions of Women of Color enough, my word. Madness.

https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flossie_Wong-Staal

The LGBTQ community has seen controversy regarding acceptance of different groups (bisexual and transgender individuals have sometimes been marginalized by the larger community), but the term LGBT has been a positive symbol of inclusion and reflects the embrace of different identities and that we’re stronger together and need each other. While there are differences, we all face many of the same challenges from broader society.

In the 1960′s, in wider society the meaning of the word gay transitioned from ‘happy’ or ‘carefree’ to predominantly mean ‘homosexual’ and was an umbrella term that meant anyone who wasn’t cisgender or heterosexual. The community embraced the word ‘gay’ as a mark of pride.

The modern fight for queer rights is considered to have begun with The Stonewall Riots in 1969 and was called the Gay Liberation Movement and the Gay Rights Movement.

The acronym GLB surfaced around this time to also include Lesbian and Bisexual people who felt “gay” wasn’t inclusive of their identities. 

Early in the gay rights movement, gay men were largely the ones running the show and there was a focus on men’s issues. Lesbians were unhappy that gay men dominated the leadership and ignored their needs and the feminist fight. As a result, lesbians tended to focus their attention on the Women’s Rights Movement which was happening at the same time. This dominance by gay men was seen as yet one more example of patriarchy and sexism. 

In the 1970′s, sexism and homophobia existed in more virulent forms and those biases against lesbians also made it hard for them to find their voices within women’s liberation movements. Betty Friedman, the founder of the National Organization for Women (NOW), commented that lesbians were a “lavender menace” that threatened the political efficacy of the organization and of feminism and many women felt including lesbians was a detriment.

In the 80s and 90s, a huge portion of gay men were suffering from AIDS while the lesbian community was largely unaffected. Lesbians helped gay men with medical care and were a massive part of the activism surrounding the gay community and AIDS. This willingness to support gay men in their time of need sparked a closer, more supportive relationship between both groups, and the gay community became more receptive to feminist ideals and goals. 

Approaching the 1990′s it was clear that GLB referred to sexual identity and wasn’t inclusive of gender identity and T should be added, especially since trans activist have long been at the forefront of the community’s fight for rights and acceptance, from Stonewall onward. Some argued that T should not be added, but many gay, lesbian and bisexual people pointed out that they also transgress established gender norms and therefore the GLB acronym should include gender identities and they pushed to include T in the acronym. 

GLBT became LGBT as a way to honor the tremendous work the lesbian community did during the AIDS crisis. 

Towards the end of the 1990s and into the 2000s, movements took place to add additional letters to the acronym to recognize Intersex, Asexual, Aromantic, Agender, and others. As the acronym grew to LGBTIQ, LGBTQIA, LGBTQIAA, many complained this was becoming unwieldy and started using a ‘+’ to show LGBT aren’t the only identities in the community and this became more common, whether as LGBT+ or LGBTQ+. 

In the 2010′s, the process of reclaiming the word “queer” that began in the 1980′s was largely accomplished. In the 2020′s the LGBTQ+ acronym is used less often as Queer is becoming the more common term to represent the community. 

Still a good precaution. And definitely necessary for everyone for when life has returned to normal in like three years just in case you meet the love of your life and they’re positive.

Couldn’t share this fast enough.

Rebloging this to add a little more info because it’s very important:

Antiretroviral therapy when used correctly can cause the user’s “viral load” (your viral load is how much of the virus is in your bloodstream), to drop because the medicine prevents HIV from creating copies of itself.

Regular blood tests are done to monitor your viral load, and after taking the medication long enough, it can drop so low that it becomes “durably undetectable”. This means that the HIV virus in you has become so miniscule that it can’t be detected, and by extension can’t be transmitted either. It’s important to note that in order to be considered durable undetectable, you MUST test as undetectable for at least 6 months after testing as undetectable for the first time.

Also very important, being durably undetectable does NOT mean that you’re cured or that the virus is gone, not by a longshot. The HIV virus is still very much there, but instead of being active, it’s gone dormant in a small number of cells called “viral reservoirs”. This why it’s EXTREMELY important that even after achieving durably undetectable status, you continue to take your Antiretroviral medications correctly. Because if you stop, the HIV virus will reemerge from the viral reservoirs and pick up right where it left off in creating copies of itself, and you will have to start all over again if you want to become durably undetectable again.

This is great advice for people struggling with or know someone who has HIV.

If you're trans -- if you have a gender identity that doesn't exactly match the gender you were assigned at birth, regardless of whether you have transitioned or intend to and whether you're nonbinary -- and live in the US, ok and are 16 or older, you are eligible to fill out the 2022 US Trans Survey, crafted by trans people.

This is a big deal, it's the largest national trans survey and the last one was in 2015. The next one won't be for at least another five years.

There's some fairly personal questions and some heavy ones, like ones about harassment and domestic violence. They don't ask for your name or other definitively identifying information, and take steps to keep the rest of the data confidential. You can skip (most) questions you don't want to answer while filling out the rest. Data can be useful for lobbying politicians for things that are good for trans people, especially ones who are basically sympathetic but not sure they should prioritize trans issues. (In their words, "The USTS fills in some of the large gaps in research about transgender people, and it provides critical tools for researchers, policymakers, and advocates seeking to better understand the needs of transgender people and to find ways to improve their lives.") Most questions have set options, but there's also an opportunity at the end to share personal stories in your own words.

There's also a Spanish language version and Spanish speakers, people of color, older people, immigrants, those who live in rural areas, and people who are HIV+ are especially encouraged to fill it out (because when people don't it's harder to advocate for services for those people, even when people providing the services know damn well there's a lot of need.)

Some answers to elegibility and accessibility questions:

"The U.S. Transgender Survey documents the experiences of trans people, which it defines as anyone who identifies with a different gender than they were assigned at birth. That includes nonbinary people. We aim to be as inclusive as possible about what it means to be trans, and we welcome nonbinary people and others who identify with a different gender than they were assigned at birth to take the survey."

"No, you don’t have to be currently out or living as trans or nonbinary. The survey is open to trans people at any stage of their lives, journey, or transition."

"The survey is accessible to people with physical, sensory, and cognitive disabilities consistent with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act. The USTS is accessible for screen reader technology to assist people that are visually impaired. Please contact [email protected] with additional questions about accessibility."

In case some of you didn't know, some lawyers and conservatives are now using the Roe decision to begin calling for the ban of PrEP and all HIV related medication. Why? Because they believe that those life-saving medications "enable homosexual behavior" . They are going to be using this new power to attack and demean everyone they see as the enemy. They are stoking and fighting for a war, they want us all to die unless we assimilate under their christofascist beliefs.

To everyone who said this would "never" happen. It just did. I wish you were right, and that I was wrong.

the fact that children are both more likely to catch and to suffer death or complications like blindness from monkeypox, combined with the cdc and media's immensely irresponsible framing of it as a gay sti and the massive recent spread of "groomer" rhetoric is going to get lgbt people killed

monkeypox is just AIDS 2 because genuinely politicians can’t figure out any other conclusion to disease spread by close physical contact and/or body fluids.

Most people who contract the virus catch it from rodents and the common mode of transmission between man and rodent has not been positively identified, but as a pox virus, it is very likely to be related to an exchange of body fluids. Bites from rats carrying the virus for example mix saliva and blood. Food contaminated by rat feces that is accidentally eaten could also be a vector if it is not the type of food you cook, or at least not well enough to kill the virus. This is likely where most victims contract it as it, again like many pox viruses, is generally only infectious when one is symptomatic, especially when the lesions have started to erupt as those contain a good amount of the viral material.

Skin-to-skin contact with someone who is infected and has viral material on them can indeed be infectious, but this is not contact exclusive to sex. Children who don’t contract it from contaminated food are believed to catch it from kissing their family members, being bathed by parents, or even breast milk as some theorize.

In fact, because viruses can survive on surfaces longer than the average live organism, a child can genuinely catch it from touching a table touched by an infected person. They can catch it if an infected person coughs or sneezes near them. Pox viruses are successful because they are contagious through so many forms of contact and they are persistent. Monkeypox is a close relative to smallpox, and that is how it should be treated by the media. Can you imagine if people tried to claim smallpox was the virus of sexual deviancy? They would be laughed out of the room.

Claiming it’s exclusively an issue faced by those partaking in anal sex is such a bizarre takeaway by society. I’m not shocked, but I am disappointed. I’m formally banning every moron politician or “journalist” who doesn’t even know what a fomite is from expressing their “hot takes” about this virus to the public. We are literally just getting out of the COVID pandemic with millions dead worldwide because several western politicians decided it was “just something that killed the old and disabled” and ignored all safety protocols as soon as it grew dull, can we be adults and not do this whole thing again with monkeypox because “only gay men are effected”. Absolutely asinine that people put any stock in that claim.

In a twist of irony, the elderly are the only demographic that may not have to worry about this virus if the theory that the old smallpox vaccine grants immunity to monkeypox as well. Rudimentary testing showed efficacy of a minimum 85% at immunity to monkeypox, but this has not been studied on a very wide scale.

What a great news!👊🏻

Still in very early stages, but what a wonderful thing it would be if it works out.

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/research-shows-promising-development-hunt-hiv-vaccine/story?id=76904202

A man from London has become the second person in the world to be cured of HIV, doctors say.

Adam Castillejo is still free of the virus more than 30 months after stopping anti-retroviral therapy.

He was not cured by the HIV drugs, however, but by a stem-cell treatment he received for a cancer he also had.

In better medical news today holy absolute fuck.

Also: don’t stigmatize HIV+ individuals because they all have different circumstances and might’ve  gotten the virus from a variety of sources (sex, occupational, birth, blood transfusions in other countries). 

HIV-related stigma remains a huge barrier to preventing HIV, and is linked to a low level of people testing for HIV. 

The bad news is that Trump is cutting America’s spending on HIV year after year.  He has taken steps to weaken the Affordable Care Act since coming to power.

Wow wtf HIV/AIDS was discovered by Flossie Wong-Staal, an Chinese-American woman, and she’s the reason the HIV test even exists. AND THEN she invented the molecular knife that lead to treatments for HIV/AIDS. And she’s STILL ALIVE. We don’t hear about the contributions of Women of Color enough, my word. Madness.

https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flossie_Wong-Staal

They’re going to try and kill him.

He’s probably already dead

BOOOOOST THIS

YOOOOO

seriously guys boost this

I don’t care if it looks ugly on your blogs THIS COULD POSSIBLY SAVE LIVES

Nigerians are about to save the world

Governments are gonna kill this guy.

his name is Maduike Ezeibe, a professor at the Michael Okpara University of Agriculture Umudike, Abia State. this is huge

The world won’t get serious about this unless a post goes viral and that’s sad af You rather talk about a vine video or popular culture ok that’s fine and all but there’s a cure for HIV/Aids and america is lying There is a cure for HIV/Aids and no one will spread the news for those who are diagnosed with it, so that THE WORLD COULD WAKE TF UP There is hope for those who have been diagnosed with a disease that may have given them 20 or so years to live For the first time in the history of the world there’s is a possible preventative cure for one of the most deadliest viral diseases

Most def had to reblog this. I’m supporting him 1000%

https://www.naij.com/455113-nigeria-professor-claims-to-have-cure-for-hivaids.html

Repost & Save a Life!!!!!! Repost

There is hope .Amen Repost this would help a lot of people…

God bless this man. I hope this saves lives.

Reblog it saves lives

The tumblr app closed on me TWICE when I tried to reblog this

coincidence?

(THREE TIMES)

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! cool shit !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

REBLOG THIS SHIT OR BLOCK ME

Reblog please

@madhattey @princeofmints @androgynousblackbox @ryuronny @mrgoldsdearie @blogthegreatrouge @ship-is-love @askoswaldandedward

WHAT I S THIS

REBLOG REBLOG REBLOG

WHATSHDJD–

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends regular retesting for anyone who may have a higher chance of getting HIV. To learn more or find a testing center near you, visit HelpStopTheVirus.com

BIG PHOTOSETS FOREVER FOR THEY ARE MUCH HARDER TO IGNORE / a lot of these don’t have hi-res versions available, but i still want to post them

This was not an exaggeration. The government ignored the issue of HIV/AIDS for years before anything was done. Gay and Queer communities had to form their own clinics because no government agencies cared for them. Back then, being diagnosed was equivalent to a death sentence or extreme debt and poor quality of life/a significantly shortened lifespan.

Things got so desperate that people literally had “Die-Ins”— in contemporary usage this refers to masses of people simulating death in order to protest something (like the War in Iraq). In this case, however, fatally sick people would literally lie down in public places and protest with what little energy they had left until they died. There is some footage of a church Die-In in the documentary Beyond Stonewall.  The middle image here of that person’s jacket is not an extreme political statement; it’s what people had to do because they had no other options.

wow.

never forget

queer politics aren’t all hrc t-shirts and shiny lobbying. So many people have already forgotten this extremely recent history.

And this is still not over. HIV rates in the US are going up among young, gay men of color – almost half are expected to be infected within their lifetime at this point – and there isn’t even solid data on HIV in the trans community, but it’s off the scales, percentage-wise. 

I can not say this enough: HIV is an intersectional issue. It became a pandemic because it hit at the intersection of homophobia and racism, because it affects the poorest, most vulnerable people. It plays into our culture’s fucked up issues around sex and drugs.

And the kicker is, while there’s no cure, there are incredibly effective HIV medications. People living with HIV who have access to good healthcare and medications have the same expected lifespan as people who aren’t infected. And with proper care and treatment, the amount of virus in a person’s bloods and semen drops to nearly none and because of that, people become significantly less likely to infect others, even if they have unprotected sex.

This is why health care reform matters. This is why sex education and access to reproductive health services matter. Without them, people die.

(General note, I work in HIV education and am always happy to answer HIV-related questions people might have if I’m able. My ask box is always open and anon is on like 95% of the time.)